When my Carolina Panthers won the NFC Championship, I immediately tried to get a ticket home to Charlotte. I wanted to be around my family and friends to have the same excitement and exuberance I had watching the team 13 years ago.
Well, the Queen City felt that silence once again, this past Sunday. After the game, I received a slew of texts from California friends sending condolences. My reply to each text was the same, “Disappointed, but not devastated.”
I love sports, particularly football, because it proves that sometimes you can work your butt off and still lose. The beauty of athletics is the triumph over defeat. It is easy to use a loss as a soft pillow for self-pity. But, as believers in the power of Christ, we cannot use that excuse. He specifically told us,
“In this world, you will have trouble. But, take heart; I have overcome the world.” John 16:33
We have been built to be overcomers. When facing loss, it is ok to hurt. It’s ok to cry. It’s ok to be disappointed. However, we cannot stay there.
“But we have this treasure…that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us. We are troubled on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed…” II Corinthians 4:7-9
As much as I love my Panthers, they were not the best football example of getting up from defeat. They lost to a team who had just experienced the same feeling only 2 years earlier. The Denver Broncos licked their wounds, regrouped and came back to win it all. However, my favorite football example is the 2012 Baltimore Ravens. If you haven’t read it, check out the story in my post, “After a Loss.”
How are you handling disappointment?